dritner wrote:The GOP has nothing to worry about with Obama threatening social security again. He has 1.5 billion dollars ready to give to the muslim brother hood and no money for social security. Yea the Dems are on the right road to put a Libertarian or a GOP into office and we do not even have to try to win votes this time. Personally I am looking hard at Rand & Cruz. This out of control spending while at the same time sending our money to are enemies has to stop.

No one gets elected without the Independent vote, no one. And neither Rand nor Cruz would attract even 10% of the Independent vote. Come on Repubs, give me someone I can vote for and he or she will get serious consideration.

We can't give you someone you want. Republicans prefer financial responsibility on the part of government and it's citizens.

You want a Democrat.

Yep...Fiscal responsibility a la GW Bush. They talk the talk, but if you think a Republican is going to be more fiscally responsible than the current crop in office then I want what you are smoking.

No, not like GW Bush. That was what many of us didn't like about Bush - he wasn't (fiscally) conservative enough.

What Republicans need to do a better job of messaging is the stark contrast between the BIG GOVT party (Dems) and the limited-govt party (Repubs). And total federal spending is the measure of that difference. On 95% of all spending issues, it's the Dems on the "higher spending" side of the tug-o-war rope and Repubs on the opposite end. When the national debt is a devastating $16.8T, the task of getting that message across to the voting public should be much easier than it is.

But, the deck is stacked heavily in favor of Dems because they have the majority of the media in the back pocket. That's the real problem Repubs are facing, and that they have to find a better way to get around.

Udall vs Gardner isn't really about Udall or Gardner.

It's about HARRY REID, and whether he gets to keep his job as Senate Majority Leader. Do you like the job he's done making Congress function for the last 8 years? Yes? No?

westman1 wrote:“What did liberals do that was so offensive to the Republican Party? I’ll tell you what they did. - Liberals got women the right to vote. - Liberals got African-Americans the right to vote. - Liberals created Social Security and lifted millions of elderly people out of poverty.- Liberals ended segregation.- Liberals passed the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act.- Liberals created Medicare.- Liberals passed the Clean Air Act, the clean Water Act.What did Conservatives do? They opposed them on every one of those things, every one. So when you try to hurl that label at my feet, ‘liberal’, as if it were something to be ashamed of, something dirty, something to run away from, it won’t work, because I will pick up that label and I will wear it as a badge of honor.” – Written by Lawrence O’Donnell Jr.

The Civil Rights and Voting Rights Bills would NEVER have made it through Congress if it hadn't been for Republican support. Lyndon Johnson called Republican leadership to the signing ceremony in the Rose Garden to thank them.

Democrats of the 1960s were segregationists and racists of the first order. J. William Fullbright, Dem, AR, was one of the authors os the Southern Manifesto" which read in part "Segregation today, Segregation tomorrow, Segregation forever".

Recall Orvil Faubus, Democrat Gov of AR, barring black students from entering Little Rock High. Recall George Wallace, Democrat Gov of AL blocking black students from entering the University of Alabama. Robert Byrd, Democrat Sen form WVa, was a leader in the klan. Bull Connor was a Democrat. And on, and on, and on.

Save your breath, your historically accurate facts don't coincide with what liberals have been telling themselves in their echo chamber of misinformation and gratuitous self aggrandizing.

Ya know the GOP talks a good game about supporting business, and most local chambers of commerce are composed of GOP memebers. They will tell you they're pro business, and tell you they are working on making communities viable places for small business and blah blah blah, but then they will turn around and support the destruction of amall business by inviting a Wal Mart right into the heart of your community destroying the livelyhoods of many small business.

This just happened in Arvada where at the last City Council hearing on Wal-Mart some twit named Dot(Dottie) I assume from the Arvada Chamber, got up in support of the Wal-Mart in the old Arvada plaza putting many local viable businesses out to pasture. What this tells me, and I've seen it elsewhere is when a giant corporation gets it's tenticles into the inner workings of the city council and the local chamber, they get all googly eyed and forget about the mom and pop shop down the street who keep and spend their profits local. Who the hell knows what Wal-Mart does with their profits, but I can guaranty they don't stay local, which is bad for any small community accross this country.

As long as our local Chambers, and our City Councils keep sucking up to this mentality that bigger is better we are going to continue to see the coffers of our local municipalities run dry from corporate subsidies.

I find it insightful that the statements from both parties are truthful and illustrate the party views rather well:

"Let's stop worrying about 'we're going to get blamed, they don't like us,' " West said. "If you stand on principle, if you stand on what's right, that is what matters."

"This does nothing to expand their base," Palacio said. "This does nothing to bring new voters to their party."

Republicans are most concerned with doing what is "right"...on "principle". Democrats are most concerned with "bring(ing) new voters", "expand(ing) the base".

This difference in process is why Democrats win more elections (or alternately, why the nation is becoming more liberal decade by decade): they will do whatever is popular (without concern to what is right), and also explains why we as a nation are doomed (because what is right, has never...and you can check this in any age/civilization throughout all of history...been popular).

jhuntingtonus wrote:If the Republicans do not appeal more to the center, they will NOT get the White House in 2016. Period.

Who are the Dems thinking of running for the White House in 2016, Hillary? She isn't a centrist, but a hard core leftist, as bad as Obama.

And these "hard core leftists", as you label them, have won the popular vote in 5 of the last 6 elections (and it was close to 6 for 6). While I don't think the country is hard core left as a whole, it apparently isn't hard core right, either. Apparently, the centrists in the US felt the need to vote for the leftists lately. Unless the GOP changes (like the Dems have had to do), I don't see that trend changing- and I say that as someone that doesn't want to see ANY party have a permanent majority. However, there is no way I'd vote for Ted Cruz, and there is no way Rand Paul gets much minority support.

thebear1 wrote:Ya know the GOP talks a good game about supporting business, and most local chambers of commerce are composed of GOP memebers. They will tell you they're pro business, and tell you they are working on making communities viable places for small business and blah blah blah, but then they will turn around and support the destruction of amall business by inviting a Wal Mart right into the heart of your community destroying the livelyhoods of many small business.

This just happened in Arvada where at the last City Council hearing on Wal-Mart some twit named Dot(Dottie) I assume from the Arvada Chamber, got up in support of the Wal-Mart in the old Arvada plaza putting many local viable businesses out to pasture. What this tells me, and I've seen it elsewhere is when a giant corporation gets it's tenticles into the inner workings of the city council and the local chamber, they get all googly eyed and forget about the mom and pop shop down the street who keep and spend their profits local. Who the hell knows what Wal-Mart does with their profits, but I can guaranty they don't stay local, which is bad for any small community accross this country.

As long as our local Chambers, and our City Councils keep sucking up to this mentality that bigger is better we are going to continue to see the coffers of our local municipalities run dry from corporate subsidies.

Nice story, but it's not reality.

Next time you see a Wal-Mart, look around it. You'll likely find lots of small businesses operating right next door to it. Some of those businesses are franchises (Starbucks, Chilis, Barnes&Noble, etc) while others are not. But they all coexist with Wal-Mart just fine, thank you.

westman1 wrote:“What did liberals do that was so offensive to the Republican Party? I’ll tell you what they did. - Liberals got women the right to vote. - Liberals got African-Americans the right to vote. - Liberals created Social Security and lifted millions of elderly people out of poverty.- Liberals ended segregation.- Liberals passed the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act.- Liberals created Medicare.- Liberals passed the Clean Air Act, the clean Water Act.What did Conservatives do? They opposed them on every one of those things, every one. So when you try to hurl that label at my feet, ‘liberal’, as if it were something to be ashamed of, something dirty, something to run away from, it won’t work, because I will pick up that label and I will wear it as a badge of honor.” – Written by Lawrence O’Donnell Jr.

The Civil Rights and Voting Rights Bills would NEVER have made it through Congress if it hadn't been for Republican support. Lyndon Johnson called Republican leadership to the signing ceremony in the Rose Garden to thank them.

Democrats of the 1960s were segregationists and racists of the first order. J. William Fullbright, Dem, AR, was one of the authors os the Southern Manifesto" which read in part "Segregation today, Segregation tomorrow, Segregation forever".

Recall Orvil Faubus, Democrat Gov of AR, barring black students from entering Little Rock High. Recall George Wallace, Democrat Gov of AL blocking black students from entering the University of Alabama. Robert Byrd, Democrat Sen form WVa, was a leader in the klan. Bull Connor was a Democrat. And on, and on, and on.

Save your breath, your historically accurate facts don't coincide with what liberals have been telling themselves in their echo chamber of misinformation and gratuitous self aggrandizing.

Yip, you're factually correct. However, you are also forgetting that many of those old southern biggoted Democrats (Strom Thurmond, for example) became Republicans as time went on.

You shouldn't accuse others of ignoring historical facts while you are doing the same.

thebear1 wrote:Ya know the GOP talks a good game about supporting business, and most local chambers of commerce are composed of GOP memebers. They will tell you they're pro business, and tell you they are working on making communities viable places for small business and blah blah blah, but then they will turn around and support the destruction of amall business by inviting a Wal Mart right into the heart of your community destroying the livelyhoods of many small business.

This just happened in Arvada where at the last City Council hearing on Wal-Mart some twit named Dot(Dottie) I assume from the Arvada Chamber, got up in support of the Wal-Mart in the old Arvada plaza putting many local viable businesses out to pasture. What this tells me, and I've seen it elsewhere is when a giant corporation gets it's tenticles into the inner workings of the city council and the local chamber, they get all googly eyed and forget about the mom and pop shop down the street who keep and spend their profits local. Who the hell knows what Wal-Mart does with their profits, but I can guaranty they don't stay local, which is bad for any small community accross this country.

As long as our local Chambers, and our City Councils keep sucking up to this mentality that bigger is better we are going to continue to see the coffers of our local municipalities run dry from corporate subsidies.

Nice story, but it's not reality.

Next time you see a Wal-Mart, look around it. You'll likely find lots of small businesses operating right next door to it. Some of those businesses are franchises (Starbucks, Chilis, Barnes&Noble, etc) while others are not. But they all coexist with Wal-Mart just fine, thank you.

Nice try, but you're full of it. I suppose you've done very little in the way of research on what happens to communities rural and urban after a Wal-Marts presence. Oh sure your going to get GOPers on city councils saying wow look at the tax revenues, but rarely will they tell you what was lost to the coffers from other small businesses and the cultural loss of those businesses. Oh I forgot you GOPers don't care about culture. You only care about profit and how you can bennefit from it while everyone else suffers.

Are you aware that almost every Wal-Mart in the country costs their local communities an average of about a million dollars a year in subsidies directly to the Wal-Mart and externalized costs that you and I pay for the health care, housing, and food subsidies for their employees because Wal Mart pays so low and provides no bennefits, not to mention people don't even get a 40 hour work week.

CarpaDM wrote:How did Reagan win two back to back landslide victories? If the GOP wants to win, study Reagan and apply what you learn.

And should the Dems run somebody like FDR who was elected four times? I think both FDR and Reagan were of their times. In fact, Reagan was a big FDR supporter. It seems to me that both parties lack ideas and imagination.

westman1 wrote:“What did liberals do that was so offensive to the Republican Party? I’ll tell you what they did. - Liberals got women the right to vote. - Liberals got African-Americans the right to vote. - Liberals created Social Security and lifted millions of elderly people out of poverty.- Liberals ended segregation.- Liberals passed the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act.- Liberals created Medicare.- Liberals passed the Clean Air Act, the clean Water Act.What did Conservatives do? They opposed them on every one of those things, every one. So when you try to hurl that label at my feet, ‘liberal’, as if it were something to be ashamed of, something dirty, something to run away from, it won’t work, because I will pick up that label and I will wear it as a badge of honor.” – Written by Lawrence O’Donnell Jr.

The Civil Rights and Voting Rights Bills would NEVER have made it through Congress if it hadn't been for Republican support...

Absolutely...the support of LIBERAL and MODERATE Republicans (you know, the ones you'd call RINOs today). Support among liberal, northern Democrats was either 100% or close to it, as I recall.

The idiots who voted against this were all the segregationists, who changed parties from Democrat to Republican in the 1950s and 1960s because the Democratic Party moved towards the left, particularly on civil rights.

westman1 wrote:“What did liberals do that was so offensive to the Republican Party? I’ll tell you what they did. - Liberals got women the right to vote. - Liberals got African-Americans the right to vote. - Liberals created Social Security and lifted millions of elderly people out of poverty.- Liberals ended segregation.- Liberals passed the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act.- Liberals created Medicare.- Liberals passed the Clean Air Act, the clean Water Act....

You forgot that Liberals:- Built public housing that became the crime infested slums of Chicago, Detroit, New York and Washington DC.- Put cities and states into fiscal insolvency.- Provided government programs that drove primarily black fathers away.- Crafted speech codes on college campus that forbid any speech that did not comport with it's own.- Rounded up people, stripped them of all their possessions, and sent them off to prison camps merely for their Japanese heritage.

jhuntingtonus wrote:If the Republicans do not appeal more to the center, they will NOT get the White House in 2016. Period.

Who are the Dems thinking of running for the White House in 2016, Hillary? She isn't a centrist, but a hard core leftist, as bad as Obama.

And these "hard core leftists", as you label them, have won the popular vote in 5 of the last 6 elections (and it was close to 6 for 6). While I don't think the country is hard core left as a whole, it apparently isn't hard core right, either. Apparently, the centrists in the US felt the need to vote for the leftists lately. Unless the GOP changes (like the Dems have had to do), I don't see that trend changing- and I say that as someone that doesn't want to see ANY party have a permanent majority. However, there is no way I'd vote for Ted Cruz, and there is no way Rand Paul gets much minority support.

What we really have a a great disconnect between the elections for president, and all other offices. When you look at both houses of Congress, and at major state-level offices across the country, Republicans are actually doing quite well. The House and Senate are basically tied (each party holding a solid majority) and Republicans hold a majority of the governorships and state houses.

Why is the presidency an anomaly within that big picture? 2 reasons, IMO... #1 is the elephant in the room that few are willing to talk about - Obama is the first black president, and enough swing voters still felt too guilty to vote him out (even though on the same issues and poor performance, a white incumbent would have been). #2 is that the presidency is the most national media-influenced race, by a mile. National media doesn't get nearly as involved in individual state races, or Congressional races. Maybe the Senate some since it's the next "biggest" position behind the presidency, but very little for House races and for state races.

It's no coincidence that Dems hold most of the positions where the national media exercises massive influence, and Republicans hold most of the positions where the national media doesn't have massive influence.

Udall vs Gardner isn't really about Udall or Gardner.

It's about HARRY REID, and whether he gets to keep his job as Senate Majority Leader. Do you like the job he's done making Congress function for the last 8 years? Yes? No?

thebear1 wrote:Ya know the GOP talks a good game about supporting business, and most local chambers of commerce are composed of GOP memebers. They will tell you they're pro business, and tell you they are working on making communities viable places for small business and blah blah blah, but then they will turn around and support the destruction of amall business by inviting a Wal Mart right into the heart of your community destroying the livelyhoods of many small business.

This just happened in Arvada where at the last City Council hearing on Wal-Mart some twit named Dot(Dottie) I assume from the Arvada Chamber, got up in support of the Wal-Mart in the old Arvada plaza putting many local viable businesses out to pasture. What this tells me, and I've seen it elsewhere is when a giant corporation gets it's tenticles into the inner workings of the city council and the local chamber, they get all googly eyed and forget about the mom and pop shop down the street who keep and spend their profits local. Who the hell knows what Wal-Mart does with their profits, but I can guaranty they don't stay local, which is bad for any small community accross this country.

As long as our local Chambers, and our City Councils keep sucking up to this mentality that bigger is better we are going to continue to see the coffers of our local municipalities run dry from corporate subsidies.

Nice story, but it's not reality.

Next time you see a Wal-Mart, look around it. You'll likely find lots of small businesses operating right next door to it. Some of those businesses are franchises (Starbucks, Chilis, Barnes&Noble, etc) while others are not. But they all coexist with Wal-Mart just fine, thank you.

Nice try, but you're full of it. I suppose you've done very little in the way of research on what happens to communities rural and urban after a Wal-Marts presence. Oh sure your going to get GOPers on city councils saying wow look at the tax revenues, but rarely will they tell you what was lost to the coffers from other small businesses and the cultural loss of those businesses. Oh I forgot you GOPers don't care about culture. You only care about profit and how you can bennefit from it while everyone else suffers.

Are you aware that almost every Wal-Mart in the country costs their local communities an average of about a million dollars a year in subsidies directly to the Wal-Mart and externalized costs that you and I pay for the health care, housing, and food subsidies for their employees because Wal Mart pays so low and provides no bennefits, not to mention people don't even get a 40 hour work week.

Wanna know why Walmart does so well, in both larger and smaller communities? Because their CUSTOMERS love the low prices. Little mom-and-pop shops are EXPENSIVE. And inconvenient. Walmart is far more efficient, offers far more goods in one store, and is far cheaper on the whole.

And it's not just Walmart. Home Depot is the same way for home improvement goods/services. King Soopers is for groceries. Costco is for general merchandise. Etc. etc. etc.

You can pine for the days of the tiny mom & pop shops all you want, but most shoppers LIKE the convenience and efficiency and lower prices that large discounters provide.

Udall vs Gardner isn't really about Udall or Gardner.

It's about HARRY REID, and whether he gets to keep his job as Senate Majority Leader. Do you like the job he's done making Congress function for the last 8 years? Yes? No?

Ronald Reagan did, in fact, sign off on some of the biggest tax increases in US history.

Bills signed by Reagan, the vast majority of which originated in a Republican controlled House of Representatives, gave us some giant tax increases:

*Near doubling of the payroll tax, as well as expanding the number of workers forced to pay it.

*Taxing Social Security benefits for the first time ever.

*Ended tax breaks for capital gains.

*Expanded the AMT.

*Eviscerated tax shelters by disallowing most investment losses. Look up the term "passive activities rules".

There's more, but those are some of the highlights. I could also mention things like a near doubling of all excise taxes.

Cutting tax rates doesn't decrease taxation if more income is taxed than was taxed before, if deductions are disallowed, if taxes other than the income tax are increased. That's known as "base broadening", and it's just another way to increase taxes, while making it look like you're cutting taxes, at least to the incurious.

For further study, read TEFRA 1982, the Social Security Reform Act of 1983, and the Tax Reform Act of 1986. All of which originated in a Republican controlled House of Representatives and were signed into law by Dutch himself. Who, last I heard, was a Republican.

Of course, earlier in his career, he was a Democrat and a union boss as well. After switching sides to run for Governor of CA, he then, as governor, pressured a Democratic led CA legislature into imposing income tax withholding from wages for the first time in CA history.

He would certainly have earned his "fiscal responsibility" mantel had he and the Republican controlled House had not had such an obsession with Defense spending.

Oh yeah. Another thing. He also signed into law a huge expansion of what has now become (by laws originating in a Republican controlled House) the biggest welfare program in US history. The earned income credit now totals about $100 billion per year. Fun fact--it was first signed into law (in a much more limited form) by none other than Tricky Dick Nixon.

Then there's another $30 billion in refundable child tax credits, the expansion of which were part of the Bush era tax cuts. Originally, under Clinton, it was non-refundable. Bush and the Republicans turned it into full blown welfare.

Apparently, Republicans are OK with fiscal responsibility as long as it doesn't involve defense spending cuts, or cuts to the budget of the biggest government agency in the US (the Department of Homeland Security--created by a Republican Congress and president), the two of which together account for almost 3/4 of discretionary spending. They also seem to be OK with welfare, as long as it's administered by the IRS.

On edit: As pointed out to me below, the Republican Party did not control the House of Representatives from 1981-1987. They controlled the Senate during those years.

Last edited by JMadison on July 29th, 2013, 11:10 am, edited 1 time in total.

"The real division is not between conservatives and revolutionaries, but between authoritarians and libertarians"

westman1 wrote:“What did liberals do that was so offensive to the Republican Party? I’ll tell you what they did. - Liberals got women the right to vote. - Liberals got African-Americans the right to vote. - Liberals created Social Security and lifted millions of elderly people out of poverty.- Liberals ended segregation.- Liberals passed the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act.- Liberals created Medicare.- Liberals passed the Clean Air Act, the clean Water Act.What did Conservatives do? They opposed them on every one of those things, every one. So when you try to hurl that label at my feet, ‘liberal’, as if it were something to be ashamed of, something dirty, something to run away from, it won’t work, because I will pick up that label and I will wear it as a badge of honor.” – Written by Lawrence O’Donnell Jr.

Seriously? Lets take just one of your allegations of liberal largess. Women and the right to vote. Here from Wikipedia:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women's_s ... ted_StatesA snippet;On January 12, 1915, a suffrage bill was brought before the House of Representatives but was defeated by a vote of 204 to 174, (Democrats 170-85 against, Republicans 81-34 for, Progressives 6-0 for).[69] Another bill was brought before the House on January 10, 1918. On the evening before, President Wilson made a strong and widely published appeal to the House to pass the bill. It was passed by two-thirds of the House, with only one vote to spare. The vote was then carried into the Senate. Again President Wilson made an appeal, but on September 30, 1918, the amendment fell two votes short of the two-thirds necessary for passage, 53-31 (Republicans 27-10 for, Democrats 26-21 for).[70] On February 10, 1919, it was again voted upon, and then it was lost by only one vote, 54-30 (Republicans 30-12 for, Democrats 24-18 for).[71]There was considerable anxiety among politicians of both parties to have the amendment passed and made effective before the general elections of 1920, so the President called a special session of Congress, and a bill, introducing the amendment, was brought before the House again. On May 21, 1919, it was passed, 304 to 89, (Republicans 200-19 for, Democrats 102-69 for, Union Labor 1-0 for, Prohibitionist 1-0 for),[72] 42 votes more than necessary being obtained. On June 4, 1919, it was brought the Senate, and after a long discussion it was passed, with 56 ayes and 25 nays (Republicans 36-8 for, Democrats 20-17 for).[73] Within a few days, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Michigan ratified the amendment, their legislatures being then in session. Other states followed suit at a regular pace, until the amendment had been ratified by 35 of the necessary 36 state legislatures. After Washington on March 22, 1920, ratification languished for months. Finally, on August 18, 1920, Tennessee narrowly ratified the Nineteenth Amendment, making it the law throughout the United States.[74]

Sounds like Woodrow Wilson was instrumental in passing this. Now, where did ol' Woodrow stand on the left-right scale? He'd be a Kennedy liberal by today's standards.

Worth noting: in the early 1900s, the Republican and Democratic parties were very different than they were today. Republicans were strongly identified with progressive causes like women's rights, along with anti-monopolistic and anti-trust laws, child labor laws, and tree-hugging (T.R. was, in fact, a Republican, but there exists NO Republican who would today vote for this guy). Democrats were strongly identified with Southern politics, but had a very liberal wing (i.e., Wilson).

Beginning in the 1950s, the switch happened, and the trigger was the civil rights movement. At the time, Republicans were a politically moderate, pro-business party that was not opposed to progressive social issues (it was Eisenhower who really took the first substantive steps towards equal rights, by forcibly desegregated the armed forces and backing down Faubus). Democrats were highly fractured between the southern segregationists and northern liberals.

The civil rights movement fractured and realigned the parties. The southern segregationists all either moved to the Republican side, or became born-again civil rights believers (like Byrd, who had been in the at one point but became a huge civil rights supporter).

This wing of the Republican party eventually became dominant, but it didn't happen overnight. As late as the mid-70s, you had Nixon acting HUGELY liberal on issues like civil rights, equal rights for women, government-run health care, and eco-politics. Then came Reagan, and the "southern strategy," and the party was purged of its remaining liberal elements, and the Democrats were the liberal party.